Sarah Cruz

Why I chose Johnson

Johnson isn’t your typical business school filled with finance robots – there are so many amazing minds representing diverse fields. Meeting with current students really personified the vast array of points of view from whom I would have the privilege of calling classmates, peers, and, potentially – lifelong friends.

Distinctions and Awards

August 14 2016

A Summer of MBA Memories and Friends

It was May 2016 and our first b-school year was coming to an end (humming Semisonic’s “Closing Time.”) We had an amazing year in the Cornell Executive MBA Metro NY program, complete with new friendships and a Casino night documenting all our silliness with a photo booth.

Summer break? More like summer cram – cram every remotely fun activity you could possibly imagine into eight weekends. Summer break came and went so quickly we barely knew what hit us. Think of Nelly’s “Ride Wit Me” played on hyper-speed. Most people from the program made plans for every weekend to make sure they: a) saw all the friends they hadn’t seen since last July, and b) assured their families they were still alive.

My summer started with the familiar comforting glow of my television. I was only able to keep up with one show this past year, The Walking Dead, which was totally worth staying awake for on Sunday nights – even on class weekends. I pressed the DVR menu to see what I missed over the past 11 months. Entire seasons of shows… Project Runway, Pitbulls and Parolees, Modern Family, Chopped, Mr. Robot, the list goes on. Ironically, I had so many plans for the weekends that I barely caught up on any shows myself.

A teammate’s housewarming, a weekend of food in Hudson, NY, and a Cornell girl’s trip to Aruba kicked off my first few weekends. The next few were spent with family and packing for a move. I don’t know what possessed me to move smack in the middle of my only break but I love my new home so far. Speaking of new, I’m also five months into a new corporate retail/demand planning management role at a fabulous lifestyle and shoe brand. I do believe Cornell was a key factor in this move. I am one of a few members in my class to have already made career changes so if that’s something you’re thinking of, it is definitely a possibility – though not a guarantee.

Summer break came just as quickly as it went and I found myself packing to head back to Ithaca. A close group of us decided to start off the residential week early with a two-day stay at a house on Cayuga Lake. Fishing, sunsets, and fire pits were frequent activities while we relaxed and reminisced about how just a short year ago we had no idea about the great friends we’d make at b-school.

Is a Cornell MBA the best decision I’ve made in the past 10 years? Absolutely. I’ll just have to remember I said that once the Valuation and Investment Banking classes kick off in a few weeks… Perfect track for right now – M83’s “Ok Pal.”